There's a bit of Pinocchio in Mega Man's story, what with the kindly father figure creating a "son" out of artificial materials. And, yeah, there's some melancholy in there, too. Melancholy that digital artist Madec Brice captures in his beautiful portrait of the Blue Bomber.

Over on DeviantArt, Brice also mines the loneliness that must be part of Samus Aran's galaxy-spanning bounty-hunting. Heck, he even makes He-Man archnemesis Skeletor seem a little bummed-out and in need of sympathy. Brice's work lends a veneer of shadowy gravity to his subjects. Great stuff.